I started my nurse training in learning disability at Meanwood Park in 1979. I worked there for about three and a half years. I'd never done any nursing before when I went there and to begin with I volunteered at a social group one night a week. I just enjoyed it, so I decided to do my training in learning disability.

Meanwood was a massive institutional hospital. There were what they used to call villas, which were detached houses that housed about thirty residents. I would say there were fifteen of those villas and two other children's villas.

It was mostly adults with learning disabilities and physical disabilities and for the children it was the same. Unfortunately a lot of the adults had been there a long time, possibly going back to when they were quite young - possibly because of issues, some behavioural issues, that couldn't be looked after at home, then they were sent there. It wasn't ideal, but at the time, it was the only option. And family didn't have the support in the community that they have now.

Meanwood then closed at the end of the 80’s and people were moved into the community, in smaller group homes. But a lot of them had grown up in Meanwood, it was their home. But to outsiders, it looked archaic. And you know, it wasn't perfect, by no means, but the majority of staff worked hard, they tried to make it the best they could. And I would say the conditions were not good, but you just had to make the best because the residents needed looking after, they needed care and that’s what people were doing their best to give them.

It wasn’t perfect but we tried to make the best for them and at the end of the day it was their home and most of them had been there all their lives and didn’t have family contact. So that was their family, the other people in the villa they lived in.